Jesse Lin 0:09
Welcome back to season three of “But where are you really from?”
Full Transcript (Note: Transcribed via AI, may contain errors)
Angela Lin 0:15
Oh my God three, also, we’re on camera. Not everyone can see us. But we’re starting to record on camera for all of our episodes now. So it’s weird.
Jesse Lin 0:27
Yes, you’ll see our recording environments in excruciating detail.
Angela Lin 0:34
Anyways, Happy New Year,
Jesse Lin 0:36
Happy new year are finally in 2021 round that bend looks the same on the other side of the bend for right now. But hopefully soon things will change.
Angela Lin 0:48
I know it’s kind of interesting, because I feel like everyone was just banking on 2021 coming to like save the day, like is life really like gonna be that different?
Jesse Lin 0:59
I mean, I feel like it was the same thing as when Corona first started, where everyone was just like, Oh, we know it’s here. But because nobody’s saying anything. We’re just going to ignore it and go to bars and stuff. I did that.
Angela Lin 1:09
I mean, people will seem hopeful with a vaccine and whatnot. I don’t know.
Jesse Lin 1:14
Yeah, sure. I mean, but like, that’s gonna be like half, like, you know, 50% of the way through the year. And we’ll we’ll see. I like to say that. I think of things as a pessimistic optimist. So, I’m simultaneously hopeful, but I’m not holding my breath.
Angela Lin 1:35
I got it. How are your holidays?
Jesse Lin 1:39
They were really nice, because I took an entire week off between Christmas and New Year’s and the positioning of the holidays was amazing this year, because Chrismas was on a Friday and New Years was on Friday. So I really only take four days off, even though it doesn’t really matter. Because where am I gonna go with the extra vacation days? But if things do resolve you won’t be seeing me in the US for very much.
Angela Lin 2:01
Oh, goodbye.
Jesse Lin 2:03
Yeah, how was your time off?
Angela Lin 2:05
Good. I mean, didn’t do anything exotic, since none of us could. But it was really nice to like, not open my work laptop or my work email and all that stuff. And I was hyper productive, which it’s I feel bittersweet about because I’m like, well, I got a lot of shit done with like a podcast. And I started this like, well, I’ve been doing it for a while. But uh, but like, putting more effort into this illustration thing I’m doing the three rascals find me on Instagram. And like other shit, but basically, I like got a lot done with all my side. hustles but I wasn’t super restful. You know?
Jesse Lin 2:54
Okay, well, Alright, guys, we wanted to kick off this season with a discussion about the death of the city because we both live in cities right now. And I think there were really a lot of amazing things that the city or the urban environment offered us when we were younger, even to mid to late 20s. Sorry, the things that were really great that the cities offered us and still do, but I think with everything that’s happened with the Coronavirus, a lot of people are rethinking whether or not what made urban spaces so great will still exist and whether or not it’s worth it to continue to stay in a city.
Angela Lin 3:42
Yeah. So I think we wanted to kick off this topic by throwing some stats out at you, which we usually never do. But it’s a good way to set things up. Because like Jesse’s saying, I mean, there’s been a huge decline of life in the city, frankly, since Coronavirus, first started. And two big factors or numbers to look at that indicate that are frankly number of people that have left overall and also the number of businesses that are shut down because our economy has been taking a beating ever since COVID. So Jesse, how’s New York doing?
Unknown Speaker 4:22
Yeah. So I think even prior to COVID happening, there was a pretty large exodus of people already kind of occurring, given that New York City has basically gotten more expensive every year since the early 2000s. And you know, Something’s got to give at some point. So there was already a think some amount of people leaving, but according to wrote an article from Reuters between January 1 of 2020, and December 7 of 2020, around 3.5 7 million people left New York City and they got this information based off of cell phone, anonymized cell phone location data, so like people’s cell phones no longer pinging those same towers, they did say that, although there were people that left, obviously, the population is always in a state of flux. So there was almost an equal amount of people coming into the city for the left. Yeah. But the article does say that the people that moved in, were earning lower average incomes during the same period. So like, the whole idea of kind of a sense of economic white flight, where the rich people are like, leaving, and they’re leaving makes things actually a little bit more affordable. Actually, like in Manhattan, the prices have really tanked.
Angela Lin 5:39
Damn, but where do you think the 3 million influx of people is coming from just like people who’ve always wanted to live in New York and now feel like it’s affordable? Or like people who are living in surrounding neighborhoods but work in the city?
Jesse Lin 5:54
That’s a really good question. I don’t really know. But I kind of, I mean, in my mind, the way I think about it is even though economy has shrunk, services has shrunk. And basically, the amount of jobs have shrunk. It’s still the largest pool, like largest concentration of jobs, and easiest like area for people to find jobs, because there are so many businesses still concentrated here. Those that are left in any case, versus like, if you can imagine, you know, you’re out in a more rural part of New York that’s facing the same restrictions, and there’s not as many restaurants or businesses there already, it can be probably even worse, because you really have like these handful of options as your employers, and most of them have to close because they’re non essential.
Angela Lin 6:46
Interesting. I have my own opinion about that for San Francisco. But I’ll withhold until you finish here.
Jesse Lin 6:53
Yeah, sure. Speaking of businesses, there has also been very obviously a huge contraction in businesses, especially in like one of our hugest sectors, which is tourism. So according to the New York Times, more than 2800 businesses in New York City have permanently closed since March 1. And this is also data that they got from Yelp. And this is obviously a huge amount of businesses, I think they said that it’s a higher number than in any other large American city.
Angela Lin 7:24
Well, I can chime in there, too, for San Francisco, because I think the stats are kind of interesting. The I don’t have the same stats as you about the out flow versus influx, like I don’t know how many people have moved to San Francisco since but from Business Insider, as of December 1 89,000, households have left San Francisco. And for frame of reference, San Francisco’s population is somewhere between like eight to 900,000. So if you think a household is I don’t know, if you take an average, like two, two people per household, that’s 170,000 people out of 800, or 900,000 people have left, that’s like a huge percentage of people. And I can just speak anecdotally that it does feel like a ghost town here, like it feels like a lot of people have left. And contrary to what you were saying about New York still being like a valid place for people to want to move to because of the density of like business opportunities there. What’s interesting about San Francisco’s flight is that our whole city is based on tech, like the the reason people want to be here. And the reason the economy grows here is because of all the tech companies and the startups here. And those are the companies that are most able to transfer into remote work. And most of those companies have adapted into, like, you can live not in San Francisco, at the very least you don’t have to live in the city to work for us anymore. And at the like most luxurious like Twitter, they’ve said that forever. You can Yeah, they will never have a mandatory, you know, headquarters where you have to work from anymore. So there’s actually zero reason for anyone to want to move to San Francisco right now, because it’s honestly not that great of a city to be honest, like I’ve never loved it very much. And the main reason to be here was your job. And it’s not that reason anymore. So I don’t know what the number is of people who’ve moved here. But if I had to guess it’s not equivalent to the number of people who’ve left and the business side I think it’s really interesting because you said in New York 2800. I’m looking at your notes, 2800 businesses have closed. And I guess from a scale standpoint, San Francisco is getting crushed much more than New York because New York I don’t know how many businesses but like I live there too. It’s like every, every square foot has a business on it, right? So for 2800 to have closed, sounds like you know, not a few number, but from like a scale wise, it doesn’t sound like a huge percentage versus in San Francisco, much smaller city as of August from the same data set as you so Yelp 2000 businesses have permanently closed and a 5000 have temporarily closed because of COVID. And that’s from August. So that was when there was still hope that, you know, the shutdowns were gonna end sometime soon. So I’m sure way more than 2000 have permanently shut down since then. And it’s just, it’s so tragic. Because we yeah, like I said, we only have 800,000 ish people in the city total. So for 2000 plus businesses to have closed, we’re just getting demolished out here.
Jesse Lin 11:00
Yeah. You know, something you said that was really interesting is that you kind of mentioned that it’s like a ghost town in San Francisco right now. And what’s interesting for me is I don’t go into Manhattan anymore. So I have no idea what Manhattan looks like. But my local, like my immediate neighborhood, it feels more or less about the same, like I feel like, more or less about the same people are moving around at the regular hours of the day, maybe it might be like, you know, later at night, you won’t see as many people as you used to see because you know, subway closes now. But in my immediate neighborhood, mostly everything has stayed the same. And I can back that up with the fact that most, most of the businesses that I have, that I usually patronize have not closed, even though that they’re are restaurants and bars. So I do want to I guess I do want to caveat that is that. I think it is very different neighborhood by neighborhood. And it really depends on the composition of the neighborhood, like if it’s largely transient people, not like homeless people, but like, you know, people who are just there to work for a few years, and then they leave versus Manhattan, which is kind of largely like that. And since Manhattan is also largely offices, it’s pretty easy to see why it would look very different. And perhaps the business shrinkage there is much larger than it is in other areas. Like where I live, which is mostly residential people have lived here for a while like it’s their home. And so it’s a little bit more stable here.
Angela Lin 12:36
What originally drew you to the city, you’ve been there forever, like I left New York in twenty.. oh, wow, 2015? I think? So it’s been a hot second. And obviously, I live in a different city, but it’s not ever going to be the same as New York. What drew you there?
Jesse Lin 12:52
Well, to be honest, lots of television media, probably watching too much Gossip Girl.
Angela Lin 12:58
Oh, yeah. Yes.
Jesse Lin 13:02
And also probably like, partially because you were there for a year and you made it sound really fun and rewarding. The third thing was I really wanted to get away from where I grew up, and really become like a fully independent person. And just kind of like, throw away the person that I was all the way up until I turned 18 in graduate high school and tried to, like upgrade myself into this, like new version of me. So I think that was like originally the reasons why I came. And once I got here, the reasons why I stay. The first thing is like convenience, like New York City is so convenient. Like once you understand how to navigate like subways, buses, and food ordering, you literally like it’s so easy to live here. The second thing, obviously, I think, is nightlife. Like, there are so many amazing venues places, like or we can talk about like large venues like Webster Hall, but they’re also like smaller venues, speakeasies. And these places like exists, like, you know, in every large city, I’m sure there’s businesses like it, but the quantity of businesses here and the fact that it’s like a revolving door, makes it so fun, because like you go to and you might go to a neighborhood, you know, once every few months, you know, because you can’t go to every neighborhood every month, but you go back and it’s like a brand new neighborhood, businesses cleaned out, there was a bar there, there’s now a new bar there. So it was very fun to kind of be living in that always changing environment. And the third thing is that I’m gay and I wanted to be in a place where there are tons of gay people. Like I wanted to, like feel that kind of community and feel comfortable in a place in a sense that nobody cares that you’re gay here. So that’s I think those are like the primary three reasons that I’ve stayed in the city. What about you in San Francisco?
Angela Lin 15:02
That’s easy it’s just my job
Jesse Lin 15:03
You’re like, no…
Angela Lin 15:04
I don’t want to live here.
Jesse Lin 15:08
But, there are like no redeeming factors at all?
Angela Lin 15:11
Well, okay, first I moved here for my job. But also because I had lived outside of California for so many years that I had been like desperately wanting to come back to our home state, I had made the ill informed assumption that San Francisco would be much more similar to Southern California in terms of climate and people and general attitudes, which is not at all the same. So that’s part of why I don’t like it very much. But it was it was the job and being back in the state. So I could be closer to my family. So that’s what brought me here, redeeming factors. I mean, I met Ramon here, at least. Yeah, I feel like everything happens for a reason in life. So even if it’s not my favorite city, like I’ve met, I met him, I’ve met a lot of good friends here. And like, you know, that wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t come here. And like, career wise, it’s, it’s been a good move to be here. But that’s about it. It’s not because I think because in comparison to somewhere like New York, right, like I also, I lived there for seven years. And like you said, it’s it’s, like, incomparable to any other city in terms of like, diversity of people, diversity of cuisine, like access to anything all hours of the day. So, you know, trying to compare that with this city. It’s like, Oh, I mean, it has like above average food, but it’s nothing to write home about. It’s like, oh, there’s diversity. But it’s really like, three or four races. It’s not like every person on the planet like New York. And so it’s just, you know, it would never be able to compete with New York on those factors. So it just doesn’t have that. And I think we’ve talked about this before, but like the homeless population here, and the behavior of that population is so different from the homeless population in New York. So that is something that that’s the number one thing that most people complain about when they come to San Francisco, because we pay a shit ton of taxes in this state and in this city, and you just don’t see any of that money being put to solving this, like, terrible situation out here. I mean, it’s like, you, you feel you feel for the people because it’s very sad, like, the majority of them have mental illness. So it’s kind of different from New York, because I kind of felt like the percentage of people in New York that are homeless have mental illness was a smaller percentage than than other reasons. Like I felt like there were a lot of vets that came back from war and had you know, fallen on bad times, or there’s like, annoying young people that are just like Rastafarian and choose to be homeless that there’s like all sorts of homeless people in New York City, but not all of them had mental illness versus in San Francisco. It’s, it’s the majority here. So like, you can find yourself in pretty dangerous situations out here just crossing paths with people because their heads aren’t right. And that’s not their fault, but it’s just the way it is. So I don’t know how I got on this rant. Actually, I forgot. Oh, just reasons why it would never compare to New York. Yeah, I felt safe, you know, relatively safe around homeless people in New York. And I don’t feel safe in this city. Because that and COVID has made it much worse, because they have full rein of the city now. Like, you know, businesses have closed, we will have left their apartments, they’re just they get to, like claim more of the city now.
Jesse Lin 19:01
Well, let’s talk about, you know, we discussed kind of your draw was work. My draw was a couple of things related to just like quality of life, things where there are things that you’re kind of like, man, it really sucks here. Pre COVID about the city. It could be New York could be SF, whatever.
Angela Lin 19:22
Well, all the things I already talked about. No, I mean, the city is just, it’s just a weird town here. Because it’s like it’s exactly what you said. Like when I came here to visit and then when I came here to move, at first, I had the exact same thought where I was like, it’s just New York, but like on the other coast. And so I was expecting things like quality of food, nightlife, not that I care about nightlife anymore. It’s more just like, you know, just to say that you have this thing.
Jesse Lin 19:57
Yeah, you just want it on hand
Angela Lin 19:59
As an option. Yeah. And you get here and you realize, like everything cost the same as New York, like, quality of life wise, right? Like rent, actually, sometimes it’s more expensive than New York, groceries, food, cocktails, things like that, right? Like, it’s all the exact same as New York. But bars close at like two but everyone goes home at like 11 or midnight, because everyone’s kind of a grandma out here because of runs very like, they like to hike. So everything’s like, go to sleep early and wake up early kind of vibe. So like, here’s when I first moved here, I use this as a gauge. It’s like in New York, when you go to brunch. The average time is like one or 2pm is like, max, you know, peak brunch time. Which makes sense because you’re hungover from the night before. So why would you wake up earlier than that for brunch? Here, people go to brunch as early as 10am.
Jesse Lin 21:02
That’s breakfast. That’s not brunch.
Angela Lin 21:04
That’s just breakfast. There is no, it’s not even crossing over into lunch. Why would you call it brunch?
Jesse Lin 21:10
The time is breakfast.
Angela Lin 21:12
That’s what I’m saying. And, and what’s worse than that, and I do this now myself, people wake up, butt crack early to go to the like most poppin, you know, brunch spots or whatever. Right when they open. So we have one in San Francisco that we live really close to now. It’s called Plow. And it opens at 8am on the weekends, and people are lined up before 8am to go eat at this breakfast place. And I love it. Because Ramon is like, let’s get brunch at 8am and I’m like I’m hungry again.
Jesse Lin 21:53
If you’re not gonna drink, it’s not brunch.
Angela Lin 21:57
Well, some people drink which is like a miracle to me. Yeah, I know. That’s what I’m saying. Wow. Yeah.
Jesse Lin 22:03
I mean, that’s like dedication to the brunch culture, but just at the wrong time.
Angela Lin 22:09
Yeah, yeah. And one more thing, since I’m, apparently on a rant. But one of the things that originally bothered me about here, which I’m just used to at this point, is there’s no diversity of industry. Because I feel like in New York, even though finance is a big industry, it’s not like every single person you meet, works in finance. Like that’s not going to be the case or not everyone is an actor, even though finance and entertainment are big industries in New York, you can find someone doing anything in New York right? Here, it’s just tech. I mean, there are obviously there are people doing other things, but it’s like, eight out of 10 you could easily guess they work in some sort of tech or startup. And it just gets so boring.
Jesse Lin 23:01
Yeah. Yeah, it’s the same person. I definitely know what you’re saying. For sure.
Angela Lin 23:06
How about you? Any drawbacks? Even though you seem to have loved it enough to stay? Your whole adult life at this point?
Jesse Lin 23:13
Yeah. Honestly. I know people think I’m a little bit crazy. I think I’m a little bit crazy. Yeah. Well, I am a little bit crazy. But things that weren’t so great. Even before COVID. Obviously, it’s way too expensive here. And there’s like absolutely no reason it needs to be so expensive. So that’s the first thing. I’m exclusively right now talking about housing, like food, drink groceries, like I kind of get it because like it does cost money to bring all these things here into the city. But for sure, the cost of living in terms of rent is like way too high. I could talk forever and ever and ever and ever and ever about how I am in love with but simultaneously absolutely hate the public transit system here. Like, it is like such a it’s such a hot and cold topic. Because when it works, it’s amazing. And when it doesn’t work, you just want to throw yourself off a bridge like and I will say the third thing is that it’s so disappointing in a way because I feel like New York is constantly on the cusp of being really great, like a really great city. And to be honest, we don’t have really great cities in the US because either they’re not accessible or there’s no nightlife or it’s all the same people like you’re saying, There’s no diversity, like New York has all these things. And it’s like, right there, just about to be like a really awesome city. And it just never gets there because of like, political reasons, incompetence, like all these other things that are just impeding the city becoming it’s like final amazing form of what it could be. And honestly, that’s what is the saddest part about living here is because every day you look you walk outside you experience your life and you’re like, it’s great. But it could be better in in so many ways in so many easy ways, and it’s not. So that’s, I would say, that’s probably like, the biggest letdown. And also, the dating here wasn’t as good as I thought it was gonna be.
Angela Lin 25:14
What about the city in general? Like, where do you think it’s gonna be? Because I am speculating that New York and San Francisco are not going to bounce back from COVID. Like, it’s certainly not going to become a desert wasteland. But like, I don’t think there either of them are going to be as poppin as or as coveted as they used to be. Because it’s just not the same anymore with like, certain businesses leaving and like job opportunities, leaving and profile of people changing. It just I don’t think it’s gonna be the same.
Jesse Lin 25:52
I don’t think so, either. And the stats that I gave at the top of the episode, I mean, it shows that people with money are essentially leaving, right. So from that perspective, like, I think the city will be facing a really huge challenge in terms of tax money to pay for services and things to keep people coming to the city. I think that will be a really big problem for the city in the long run. I don’t know if it’s going to, I don’t know if this city is going to implode the way that people are thinking about it. Because like a lot of people are saying like, Oh, it’s gonna like explode into the way that it was in like the 80s, or the 70s, where things were like really bad and like,
Angela Lin 26:33
Like prostitutes in Times Square?
Jesse Lin 26:35
Yeah, and like the Bronx would like half the Bronx was on fire and stuff like that, like people are saying stuff like that. And I’m like, I don’t think I don’t think that’s the case. Like, that’s like a really Doom ominous scenario. But I do think that there will be some tough times ahead.
Angela Lin 26:52
Yeah. Yeah, I don’t think San Francisco is ever going to be the same, because we are dominated by one industry. And that specific industry has decided that working from this location will no longer matters, like not to say these companies aren’t gonna have San Francisco offices anymore. I think most of them are still keeping an office. But if you’re going to give people the option to work, not in one of the most expensive cities in the world that has little else to offer, besides your occupation, people aren’t going to choose to live here. So and and businesses have left so like, Tesla left, you know, like some of these, like big like you said taxes is is where it’s at, right, like the big tax revenue generating companies are leaving. And it’s not just San Francisco, it’s California. So like, it’s been pretty interesting, because I don’t know if you’ve been following but like, basically California and San Francisco specifically hate tech people, for some reason, like they’re just trying to, like, blame everything on tech people and like, don’t realize that all the money that they need comes largely from this industry that they’re like shitting on And meanwhile, the mayor of Miami is like, hey, tech companies want to move here. Let me like help you move here. And straight up a ton of tech is moving to Miami because Florida is much more liberal with like tax related situations and because the government is welcoming them versus like, antagonizing them. So I just yeah, San Francisco, California. I don’t think we’re ever gonna be the same again.
Jesse Lin 28:29
All righty. Well, Angela, do you want to tell our listeners what we have for our fortune cookie close?
Angela Lin 28:37
We want to daydream for a hot second and maybe it’s not just a daydream maybe it could be our future but so if you could work anywhere in the world and your job did not care, it did not impact your salary or taxing like any of that stuff. Where would you choose to live?
Jesse Lin 28:56
In the ideal situation? I wouldn’t pick any one place I would rotate around like every every month or so
Angela Lin 29:02
Yes, yes! Do you have top top cities though? That you would like start with?
Jesse Lin 29:07
Yeah, I mean, okay, well, I would now this dovetails with my in-a-COVID situation well, but I think I would definitely go to Taipei for a while. I haven’t seen my family there in Taiwan for a long while. I know for sure that there are things that I want to do there that are like on my list that look really fun. And it’s so cheap. It’s so cheap to be there. Like I could roll in there like a heavy hitter like 100%
Angela Lin 29:35
You could live for months there with your one month expenses.
Jesse Lin 29:43
I was just saying no income I could live for months not a problem.
Angela Lin 29:45
Surely Oh, sure. Yeah.
Jesse Lin 29:47
Yes. Well, because that family there but yeah, I think after after Taipei. I think it will be fun to visit like capital cities. So like get a taste of like Japan, in Tokyo, Seoul in South Korea and kind of just work my way all around that area. I mean, there’s so much to see. So
Angela Lin 30:08
What if we did a podcast rotation where we’re just bringing you from Tokyo tonight? And like we just rotate from Asian capitals?
Jesse Lin 30:17
That would be amazing, that would be so amazing. But yeah, I mean, like, honestly, if the job is the largest constraint on where I can be, what about you?
Angela Lin 30:28
For me, it’s interesting, because Ramon, and I actually have been talking about this for a long time, because we are trying to figure out where we want to, like, permanently, you know, settle. We, we similarly would want to live in multiple places, but I don’t think we jump as often as you. So I think, especially because we’re thinking about like the future, right? Like, with kids and stuff that are sometime coming in the future, it would be really nice to be able to spend, you know, like half the year in Spain with his parents and half the year in Taiwan with my parents, and then the grandparents get like, you know, dedicated time with the grandkids and can help raise them and teach them the language and, you know, so those are considerations for sure. And then, yeah, Ramon loves Japan, so I’m sure we’d be in Japan at some point. And like, I loved Australia, so that, yeah, I would probably live in Australia and like, bounced to New Zealand, because Australia is like, the all I could think Well, first, I preferred Melbourne, Melbourne, Melbourne, Melbourne, over Sydney, but Melbourne was essentially, California. Well, okay, sorry, Australia as a whole is basically California as a country with cute accents. That’s how I felt the whole time. But like So Cal California vibes.
Jesse Lin 31:54
Chill.
Angela Lin 31:54
Yes, super chill. Everyone’s gorgeous. The sun’s always out the beach is beautiful, beautiful food is just like, and like it seems expensive to you. So like, I remember going out and being like $16 for an acai bowl. But then I realized it was Australian dollars. I was like, Oh, it’s like $12? That’s fine. Yeah, so we would also hop different places. And hopefully, that’s a very real potential future. Okay. Well, if you have thoughts about this episode, which I’m sure you do, because many of you guys live in some of the biggest cities in this nation, or you once lived in a city. If you have thoughts about the decline of the city, write us in your opinion, or why you’re staying? Or if you could work anywhere ever in the world, where would you live? Let us know. And reminder that we are still looking for listeners story submissions, so write us in about your experience with either this topic or whatever you want at telluswhereyourefrom@gmail.com, the your is y o u r e. And I’m going to make a few more plugs. Because why not? One plug is that there are so many more of you that listen to this podcast then have shown up on our kind of ratings and reviews section on Apple podcasts, if you could do us a huge solid and click that five star rating on Apple podcasts that would help us immensely because as you know, we’re trying to do a lot of shit with this podcast. We’re trying to book bigger guests for you. So it’s more interesting content. We’re trying to expand the listener, base of the podcast, trying to do a lot of cool things. And it’s a better look for us if more of you rep us on that part of our podcast page. So please go ahead and hit five star leave us a positive review. And that’ll go a long way for us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And yeah, I guess that’s it come back next week because we we actually have a one of our first guests for the season next week and it’s gonna be someone really cool. Until next time.